


Hunger

by GorseMonster, Sheshaventures



Series: Consumption [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Animalistic, Biting, Blood and Violence, Choking, Comfort, F/M, Female Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Fluff, Mild Cannibalism, Monsters, Pseudo-Oviposition, Rough Sex, Shower Sex, Soul Bond, Soul Sex, Tentacles, Transformation, slight body horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-14
Updated: 2019-08-14
Packaged: 2020-08-23 06:09:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20238022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GorseMonster/pseuds/GorseMonster, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sheshaventures/pseuds/Sheshaventures
Summary: What lies within can surprise even the most battle-worn of souls.





	Hunger

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger Warning: This is why all gods stay in the heavens. Unless you have a stomach made of Nokia phones and a boner for body horror disguised as porn, do not read. Otherwise, pray there is mercy in heaven, for you will find none here.
> 
>   
This is when an unstoppable force and an immovable object work towards the same end. Enjoy the monsters.
> 
> For clarification, Shesha wrote all parts pertaining to the Warrior of Light, while Gorse wrote the portions pertaining to Emet-Selch. We wrote one another back and forth, which is why it reads the way it does. Please enjoy.

She noticed it, one day, while they lay in bed together. His arms held her close as he slept, while she idly turned the page of a book she was not quite interested in. A third limb, drawing her waist closer even as his arms held her shoulders and cradled her head.

When she looked down, she saw a tendril - thick as her arm - of purple-black. It only held her, and as she traced it with her eyes she saw where it emerged from beneath Emet-Selch's robes. Curious. When she moved a hand to run along its smoothness, a contented sigh blew into her hair.

Well, now.

Rather than wake him, she relaxed into his hold and decided to pursue slumber for herself. The next time they're awake, she'll ask him.

He had never intended to get _that_ relaxed around the Warrior, but one balmy night, he'd drifted off mid conversation about...something. He talked a lot in his waking hours, conversations, questions, demands. But she was just so _boring _and he, so tired, and she, so warm, and he, so very content that all he'd wanted was to bring her closer, feel more of her against him, against every part of him, skin and not-skin alike.

He stirred only mildly for the slow touch, his fingers curling in their loose hold.

It was the creaking of floorboards in the hallway outside that woke him, of all things, his brow furrowing and his eyes squinting at the morning light beaming in through the window. He grumbled on instinct, dipping his head against the Warrior's shoulder to shield his eyes, arms squeezing her tighter, the tendril around her waist pulling her closer.

Oh.

He froze, realizing that his grumbling and movements had already begun to stir her, carefully unfurling the dark, smooth appendage with the greatest care, in an attempt to, he hoped to, he was not a praying creature _but he was right now,_ praying to secret himself away before-

"Emet..?"

She felt him freeze as she blinked sleep away, for once not responding to her. He spoke so much that to force her to repeat herself stood out even in her waking state. Her hands move to still him where he had been drawing away from her, she was quite comfortable and would rather like to stay as they are.

It was smooth flesh, not clothed arms, her hand meets. Ah, right, the appendage.

"...Emet? Where did this come from?" it was so obviously him, she did not mind it. The smooth texture actually felt nice under her palms, as she ran both hands over what she could reach of it. "I don't remember you having any limbs save for the usual four."

It took a lot to stun Emet-Selch into silence, even just for the briefest moment. A bard could write a song about it.

The touch to the thick tendril still loosely curled around her waist made him let out the softest sound, eyes closing and brow furrowing as he tried to muster up the snappy words the Warrior, _his Warrior_ surely expected out of him.

"Well, there's plenty a thing you don't remember, hero. I seem to recall you staring blankly not two days ago as you tried to recall the memory of your last meal rattling around your pretty head." The rambling of his retort got shakier, a little faster in cadence as she ran both hands across the smooth, pliant surface of the appendage. He swallowed that wretched feeling of flusteredness, his voice dropping in intonation.

"This is simply a thing you did not _know_, but, I could...introduce you to."

That small, soft sound had her instantly wide awake, able to listen to him fully. The change of tone is what caught her ears, the small tremble in his voice, moreso than yet more teasing contents. Turning in place without releasing her hold on the tendril, she looks up to study the Ascian's face.

"How do you mean by 'introduce' to me? I must admit it does have me curious," she strokes it again, softly. "It feels nice, to touch. Do you feel it when I do so?" and it was, she realized, very nice to touch. The surface was smooth yet soft, firmer underneath, as if a covering of flat velvet rested over flexing muscle.

There were a lot of things that she did not understand, be it from lack of knowledge or lack of ability to do so. This, she would like to experience.

He could have cursed himself a thousand times for giving her even the slightest inclination that her touch affected him. But it had been so long, so long, so very long...

Emet-Selch brought his thoughts back to the present, biting the inside of his lip as she twisted in the loose hold of the limb, pressing herself against it. He dipped his head down to her, his lips pulling into that well-known, self-assured smirk. "Well, I could think of a whole manner of ways I could introduce you to a few more limbs, my dear," he lilted, a coy little uptick in his tone. His fingers stroked along her jaw, lightly holding her chin up to meet his appraising look. The faintest flutter of his eyelids gave away, yes he did indeed feel her touch, the tendril squeezing lightly around her waist, the tapered end of it lazily teasing her hip bone.

"Oh yes, as much as I feel any touch on this body I inhabit." There was a dip in his voice, a breath just a little more strained than the rest.

And she catches that dip, that slight straining. How could she not, with how much time he has spent speaking to her? She was as familiar with his voice as she was with her own thoughts. A smile breaks out across her face, true and bright and just for him.

"I would like for you to show me," and she runs a hand over it more firmly now, testing.

She, too, could think of a few ways he could use a limb such as this. Some more publicly appropriate than others. Still, the Ascian loved to play his games, and she decided then and there that she would play along. It certainly seemed more fun that way - to see what exactly he had in store.

"So you feel this, then, as well?" an even more firm stroke, back and forth.

His eyes narrowed. That face. _That face._ He knew that face and every time he saw it he knew he'd been caught. By something, someone, but more often than not by his own hopelessly _juvenile_ behavior around her.

The muscle beneath smooth skin tenses and flexes on the firmer touch, his face giving only the mildest twitch, which he attempted to hide by pressing his lips to hers, only seeming more needful for it. "Come now, are you sure, hero? These requests of yours never end..." he took a moment to think of the word, leaving a trail of kisses along her jaw, down to her neck. "...tidily, for you."

His breath hitches, a sharp intake as her fingers press in, stroking back and forth. From the corner of her eye she could see thumb and middle finger pressed together in anticipation, the tendril slipping further around her waist so the tapered end of it could glide from hip, across thigh to press between and curl around the limb, already getting himself thoroughly tangled with her.

"Yes, my dear. Every last sensation."

She kisses him back but it is much too brief for her as he pulls away to trace fire down her neck. "It almost seems to have a life of its own," she trails off, before turning back to the conversation at hand. "I seem to remember you offering yourself willingly to us, to me. Though I must make a confession," her voice drops to a whisper and she leans in to his ear, break ghosting hotly.

"I trust you, and I've enjoyed each and every one of those endings," she punctuates it with more stroking - she'd caught that hitching inhale of his. And she speaks the truth - regardless of whom he may serve, whom he may be, she trusts Emet-Selch. Not just the buried, forgotten-but-slowly-remembering her, but the her of today.

"Good, then, the better for me to touch you with," her other hand joins the first.

_A life of its own_ was certainly one way to term the way thick, dark-coated 'muscle' and flesh curled, squeezed and almost begged in a way Emet-Selch would never lower himself to with his voice, his hands. For all the layers and layers of sharp-tongued wit and apathetic commentary he had robed himself in, there were parts that still earnestly, wholly, fully _wanted_. And he **_wanted_**.

Her words set his mind alight, fuel thrown directly onto what were, until that point, mere embers. But now, a blazing fire that burned from his throat to the base of his hips as his thumb and finger squeezed, producing a clear **snap **that found her bereft of clothes, gone in a flicker of aether. Unhindered, the tendril making more of a tangle of itself by the moment pushes betwixt her thighs and _up_ to press up to warm skin, the limb squeezing tighter for each firm rub to its surface from her hands, finally stealing an unstifled _moan_ from the Ascian as her second hand joins the first.

Emet-Selch was without words in that moment, but what he didn't vocalize his body more than made up for as his arms pulled her in tight, crushing his lips to hers hungrily, the faintest rumble of a possessive, growling purr in this throat.

The grin comes unbidden to her face as he rids her of her clothes, the sigh from her lips also slipping out of its own accord as the tendril caresses very sensitive areas. His moan, however, shot heat into her belly and pooled it there - had he ever sounded like that in front of her? She could not recall, and found that she liked that sound _immensely._

Her lips moved against his, tongue slipping inside to tangle with his before she pulls back and _bites._ She does not draw blood, but it is a near thing, gnawing at his lip even as she hears the growl begin. She wants this. She wants that growl - it sets the pool of heat inside her to boil - and she wants now what is so obviously something he has long held back.

She squeezes, this time, nails dragging down the tendril and twisting her neck to bite at his jaw, nipping and licking. There could be sweetness in this, and there is, but more she yearns for the source of that growl.

"How many of them do you have?" she mouths against his skin.

He isn't a creature of instinct. He isn't a creature of instinct. _He isn't a creature of instinct._

That is, at least what he tries to tell himself as she returns his want with such gleeful abandon, the nerves of his skin blooming into fierce heat as she bites his lip. He doesn't give her the satisfaction of another moan, though from the way his adam's apple bobs in his throat he is swallowing each one by force. But she gets the growl, predatory and deep as her nails rake into the pliant flesh wrapped and tangled around her body, sharp teeth -that she knows were never that sharp before- grazing the skin of her shoulder as his head dips. One of his gloved hands slides from her side to brush across her breast, his thumb slowly pressing and rolling the peak of soft flesh. She can feel the way his body tremors, millennia of control so easily washed away in her presence, devotion, adoration, _need, want._

"How many...?" His voice has an uncharacteristic tremor, just like his body, his _aether_. But he smirks, pale winter gold eyes finding hers, the same dangerous expression she knows all too well. She can feel another two, three tendrils, entirely like the one tangled around her legs slip across her body, pulling her tight to him

"Enough to keep you entertained, hero." He sets upon her, pulling her up with him to push her against the wall beside the bed, pinned but not restrained by the mass of his body, pressing his lips to her throat, grazing skin with monstrously sharp teeth, lapping up pinprick dots of blood as it wells to the surface, the growl in his throat too big for a body so mortal, a growl belonging to a body she's seen before. The tendril between her legs tenses, pushing between hot folds to tease her entrance, sawing slowly back and forth teasingly. "Say please," he rumbles throatily into her ear, trailing half-formed talons across her skin.

Rumbling growls vibrate through her deliciously, and she remembers the body with which they belong. But this is no construct born of desperation and despair and eons of grief, this is _heat _and _want _and she can't find it within herself to deny any of it. Rather, she feels hunger stab through her as razor edges lovingly pierce her skin. He is coy above her, in front of her, but she sees beneath the surface at that _something _beneath tightly bound control.

"These few are expected to entertain me? Surely you think more of me than that," she wants that control to snap.

The imbalance between them is not lost on her - she, bared to him in all ways, yet still he retains all of his coverings. It is her suspicion that more hides beneath not fabric but flesh itself - more than these few tendrils. She gives an appreciative hum as her breast is toyed with, and her mouth parts as he teases her slick folds. The breath she exhales is hot, and she cannot keep the shiver out of her voice.

"Why should I ask for something when clearly, you are still holding out on me?" but she wants it, wants more. Wants what he is so set on not revealing. Wants those teeth and claws fully formed. Wants the monster beneath the man.

"I thought we were revealing ourselves to one another, _Hades_. Don't you remember?" she drops her voice to a whisper, as sultry and full of want as she can make it.

Emet-Selch's upper lip quirks in the slightest sneer as she taunts him, straightening his back to gaze down at her, the white of sharp fangs poking slightly from his upper lip. "Oh, am I not _enough?" _he sounds wounded, and she can feel something in the air, the aether, quivering under pressure, ready to break. "My dear, have I not _entertained _you with far less than this, and these?" The tendril teasingly sliding across hot flesh suddenly spearing past her entrance in one thrust, holding there for a moment...and then withdrawing.

His outward breaths are strained, leaning into her so his lips and teeth may softly graze her ear, and letting her feel the more _mortal _arousal of his body. "Say please or you shall receive nothing at all, greedy little hero," he growls, struggling to keep both physical and verbal control of the power, even as he feels the change in his gold-taloned hands creeping further across his body, a faint afterimage of a silver crown above his head, a dim glow to his eyes as he stares down at her.

Damn it all. Damn the power hearing her croon his name had over him, one tendril curling around her throat to squeeze so, so softly, so _dangerously_, while the other two wrapped around her body, biting his lip hard enough to draw blood but unable to stifle the groan she stole from him. Almost so black it could absorb the light of the room but faint shimmers of purple and gold stardust coiled within it, dripping onto her shoulder as he panted, not having realized in that second the fully-formed gold talons on his changed hands had sunk into her flesh like soft fruit.

Pressing onwards for peaked hunger is all well and good, but there is the time for softness and she knows that. For all she wants the transformation sliding over him to ravish her, for all she wants to see teeth and talons and claws and all dark manner of things spring from him - she knows he is yet a man.

A gasp is torn from her lips as he slips inside of her but the once, breath shaking on the exhale as he coils around her vulnerable, exposed neck. He could crush the life from her in an instant, could slow her breath and her lifeblood and none would know to come spare her life. But rather than move to defend she surrenders to it, relaxing the muscles there and slipping further into his hold, tilting her head up to bare herself more to him. A submission. _Trust._

Warm wetness drips down her body, red and mortal from her own wounds - and she does not protest, the pain keens but it is a reminder of how sweetly alive she is - and dark, otherworldly from his. But despite all of this. Softness.

"You have always been enough for me," the words come as a murmur, full of emotion. She frees one hand to cup at the quivering skin of his cheek, the other reaching to ghost through the crown that marks him as her King.

Breath comes shaky, hastily forced out in hot washes against her ear as he brings his senses back, a ringing in his ears that pushed here, now, somewhere far away from him. He smells copper on the air, and feels wet, sticky blood seeping around his talons, suddenly realizing, pulling them free and smoothing over with the pads of taloned fingers, the wounds closing with a fizzing wash of aether.

"That you should submit yourself, so willingly..." His voice is low, a throaty growl. He draws a hand up to his lip to wipe away the blood drawn from his teeth, viscous and sticking to his skin before it seems to smoke away into nothing. The words are there, on the tip of his tongue, flitting out to lick the last of his own blood from his lips, but he won't. He _can't _speak it. Not like this, not so...

She's so small, so delicate. He sees beneath skin and sees the fragments held together and she is his, as much as he is hers, and every part of his body is screaming, straining at the leash of his control to have her, because he needs this, he needs _her._ His silence is telling, dimly lit eyes not tearing from hers for a second as his mouth keeps moving as if to start to speak, finally finding his voice, soft and earnest, the rarest show of vulnerability. "I...need you."

Sharp taloned fingers trail up her body, leaving the lightest marks as they tug on skin, not quite enough to break it again, the smooth backs of gilded nails sliding up her neck to cradle her jaw in both hands, a fondness and reverence. "If you would want to be had....In the way I want to have you."

It's all he can do to not shed the last parts of his mundane appearance. Of Solus zos Galvus', of Emet-Selch's, and sink into the place that only _she _could _love _so unconditionally.

The cool relief of wounds closing washes through her, temporarily bringing with it a clarity that helps her to pierce the fog of her lust. Straining only slightly in his hold, she moves to kiss him, veneration in the soft brush of her lips on his, of gentle flesh gliding over knife-edged fangs without snagging. She tastes the traces of her own blood there, of his, and finds the combination pleasing. The kiss is a dance she almost remembers, instinctively showing her care without parting her flesh.

He is but a man. Powerful, darkness and ancient knowledge and unstoppable magics spun into form and contained in a vessel too small for him, but still just one man. And she would have him hold the core of him back no longer.

"You've always had me," her forehead rests upon his, shivering gently as he drags claws over skin. The depths he contains are unknown to her - but maybe he will reveal himself to her wholly. She was ready to receive him, she yearned for it more than all other things, the desire greater even than the pulse of the Blessing in her chest. "Just as I've always needed you, too."

"Take me as you will, Hades," her eyes meet his, resolute and full of love, _trust, _"Please." _His._

His lips are soft, tender, the grip of his appendages loosening as he revels in a tender action that makes his soul tumble as if in freefall, plucking at the surface of her own, beckoning that she dive with him. There's a sweetness, a bitterness, a floral taste on her tongue as he tastes of her, the swell of his aether contained by will and mortal body breaking through cracks in its surface. She is so small, and he is _too small._

It's there, on the very tip of his tongue, breaking the tender kiss to speak, finally, speak, Hades, _speak, **speak.**_

He says her name. Not the Amaurotine he <strike>adored</strike> **_loved _**so many thousands of lifetimes ago but the hero, the woman he _loves_. It's all the same and yet so different and it makes his heart beat so hard he feels it in his throat from the sheer thrill. He speaks words of love, he speaks words of trust but most of all he speaks her name as if tasting the sweetest wine, over and over.

And then he is losing himself to himself, his eyes rolling back, his skin taking on a pallid tone, gritting his teeth and ducking his head as layers of heavy Garlean robes shred to give way for limbs halfway between wings and arms, tearing the thick cloth from his body to reveal skin that is turning slate grey, flushed with a faint cherry hue in softer places, solid ridges and plates around his shoulders, down his back, around his sides and down his thighs.

This is not the same Hades she saw that night in Amaurot. This is new, a body borne of need, of devotion, of love.

_Of lust._

A mask covers the top half of his head, pale silver crown above it. It is not Emet-Selch's mask, for that is not who he is here, right now. The growl returns to his throat, and it is unfettered, unashamed and he relishes in feeling that way as the tendril that had been pressing softly at her sex this whole while sinks deep into her, two holding her legs firmly apart, the fourth around her torso, allowing gilded talons to roam across her shoulders and down her arms, feeling every part of her body new again, with this body, with _his _body.

Her name. Her _name _falling from those lips - had he ever spoken it to her, even once? - has a broken sob wrenching from her throat. This, she craved this without even knowing, craved it to a degree beyond understanding as his words wash over her, love, trust, her name. His soul plucks at her like a hand extending in invitation, a precipice yawning before them. No hesitation, no thought, and she reaches back as best she can, taking his hand and throwing them off of the cliff to dive together.

He changes, in front of her and around her and it is with chest heaving in anticipation that she relishes in him finally releasing that control. Freeing himself as surely as she feels upon gazing at this form - she is but a collection of pieces welded together with more to add but in the moment he is revealed she feels the ghost of her wholeness.

Then he is upon her, growl rumbling through her _exactly as she wanted, Gods yes she craved this so much. _There is no embarrassment in the cry that rips from her throat as he delves inside, deep, so very deep. Impossibly deep and she does not resist as he manhandles her to his liking. The submission is to him, born from love, but she does not have it in her to be overcome completely.

He explores her and she does the same where she can reach, arms roaming, fingers catching on every new texture and plane. This is the form she knew he contained, though she did not know how it looked. It is what she wanted, _hungered _for from deep within herself. Her eyes are half-lidded as they meet his.

Something swells within her. He fills her and holds her and is magnificent in his monstrosity but something else swells from deep within. It's warm and ancient and before she knows it words tumble from her lips, words that she barely understands - has never learned in this mortal life - that she has never spoken before. His name, how he makes her feel, how deeply she loves and wants him pour from her - and _she _is the one who means them, not an ancient memory.

He fills her and for a few brief moments, she is Whole.

Is it glee he feels, when she reaches back? It swells in his chest and he pulls her down with him, holding her tightly in the aether as he does in physicality. He tumbles into the starry abyss with her, and he could allow himself to fall endlessly so long as she would follow him there. His aether, so overwhelming, so hungry and let off its chain could threaten to swallow her whole were it not for the barbed wire of Her Blessing keeping her safe from his monstrous, feral desire.

His lips find hers, cool porcelain mask pressing to her cheek as he catches her in a kiss, tendrils holding her tight to his body, and him pressed tight against her, his body shuddering and grinding against hers in a needful, mortal way as the backs of smooth talons slide down to the small of her back, stopping, sharp tips pressing against skin. He trusts her. She trusts him. _She trusts him _and yet there is still one last fetter he binds himself by, no matter how tenuous as those talons press and curl.

Body rocking against hers, the muscle pressed deep within her pulls back, just for a moment, before sinking in again, her folds and clit teased by the tapered ends of the two holding her legs firmly in place, slipping along hot, aching skin to fuel her need. To steal every last sound from her body that _his _need might stand a chance at being quenched. The half-wings of his back close around her lower legs, sharp sickle talons worrying marks into her frail mortal skin that with the pouring of his aether to her, heal just as quickly as they are marked in.

The sounds he steals from her mouth begin to change, and beneath the mask his eyes lock with hers, pale winter gold piercing past mortal body and _she is there _and the words she speaks are _his_, they are _hers _they are-

In the fall of their aether, grand sails of wings unfurl, catching the air in the abyss. He is holding her. He is soaring and his mind and heart are dizzy and he is monstrous, hungry, in soul and body and he is _in love_. He is in love in the same way he was a million lifetimes ago and it did not _hurt_ this time. Together they whirl and catch stardust on wings he forgot he had, wings he forgot she had made for him, so long ago, so twisted into weapons they had become.

Gold talons sink though skin and flesh in her back, raking upwards, leaving a trail of blood but no mark as the wounds heal in their wake. The sound he makes is ecstasy, hazily speaking the same language back, the same adoration and devotion, distorted by gasped moans as his throat becomes hoarse, eventually biting his lip hard enough for black to trickle from the wound.

He pulls himself back to his senses, a slow easy glide, his talons no longer tearing through skin and flesh. He speaks the words he had been dying to since he woke, not declarations of it nor allusions to it, the words he had been dying to since he first laid eyes on her soul, and just in that moment, beautiful, complete and entire, he couldn't deny her any further.

**I love you.**

She wants him to devour her. The realization comes as he utters the words that break her inside, that swelling warm thing growing large, far too large within her. The beat of her heart racing faster, faster, far too fast as they spin together on an aetherical sea. She feels in both places at once, held safe and secure and _loved _as they spin past nebulas of rioting color. They are close, pressed so close together, and inside she grasps at the pulsing thing holding them apart. She wants it and yet at the same time-

**I love you, too.** Unhidden, as bare to him as she has always been.

The fire in her groin grows, the pressure building as heat spreads from where his tendrils relentlessly stimulate her. The repeated shock of pain - on her legs, her back, her shoulders - screams through her being but it only hints at something she _needs. _The pain is pleasure and she writhes against him, not in struggle but to feel more, be closer. She was so hot, it was so _warm_ but she needed, she _wanted-_

Her mortal form was too small for the utter rapture coursing through her. Every nerve set alight, blood pounding, yet she was _so small, too small _and deep inside of that surging _thing _welling up within she feels something gnash its jaws. She wanted him this way because this was his_ true_ self, final barrier in place but she_ does not want it there._ But through the haze of pleasure and lust she realizes that if this was _his _true self, surely she-

In the physical plane an orgasm rocks her, but she is not finished, writhing still against him, craving more, more, all he could give her. To sate his desire alongside her own. But there inside themselves, distant flecks of ethereal light shine on them, and she takes that barrier, that Blessing, holding them apart and pulls, _wrenches,** twists.**_

Awareness of her broken state claws through her as, for a brief moment, a pulse shoots out from her into the rift - with five others returning to her. Those alien pulses slam into her and at once she cries out both within and without - and she is suddenly_ far too small._

Monstrum. A portent. An omen. He could no longer control himself even as he watched the way her aether twisted and writhed _in monstrum_. His composed facade tattered shreds as limbs and appendages coiled around her possessively, the way teeth rip and tear through skin and muscle that returns but seconds later as his aether coats her body, giving her the resilience she, mortal and_ delicious,_ needed to bear what he was underneath skin, sinew and bone.

He hears it. He hears how her soul tears at the wall that keeps him from devouring her completely, and yet Hades finds himself scrambling to stop her, tangling and twisting and snarling his aether up in her own to stop her. _Don't, don't **don't,**_ he pleads, _too small, too mortal, you cannot, **She will end you!**_

But he wants her to, in all truth. Even now as he tangled up and pulled her back, allowing her to claw not at the Blessing, but at him.

Aetheric pain and physical pleasure crash into each other discordantly as she peaks around the tendril pressed deep within her, drawing an equally discordant mortal sound from his throat as her body flexes and squeezes tight on pliant flesh. Gilded talons sink into her hips, pulling her tight to his waist as instinct pulls sense from his mind. He revels in the song and his body jerks and shakes as smooth flesh thrusts harder, once, twice, a third time pressing hard and deep within. Heat floods her core as he falls over the edge into a climax. Endless hunger, cravings that he cannot fulfil scream at the back of his mind, one tendril coiling around her throat, squeezing, tighter, tighter, tighter. _Fight back. Fight back! Be **this** with me, be monstrous with me like you've always been, in the pit of your soul!_

He is begging, wanting, needful as he claims her, thumbs pressing against her_ too small_ waist, her _too small_ hips. He'd seen it. He'd seen it in the way her aether swelled and clawed and writhed and he saw _her._ He knew she had felt it. He knew she had realized it and it drove every last grain of control or sense from his body. His teeth sank into her shoulder and the two tendrils holding her legs apart vie for space within her, her body_ too small, far too small._

Hades' soul yields, a wall breaks, and she falls not with him, but into him. It is endless, and sweet, and floral, and bitter. He tastes of fruit and feels like sun-warmed clay, it is so endlessly black and so invitingly warm, and he surrounds her, without breaking her. Not even as five tethers lance through the darkness to reach her, forcing a choked sound from Hades as he fills her and devours her all at once.

There is no fight as he consumes her. The pain is so, so distant beneath the ecstasy flooding through her as he feasts upon her mortal flesh, as he takes and rends and devours and she gives herself willingly. The blood she sheds is faintly luminescent. _Feast upon me, sup upon this frail frame_, she cannot stand not becoming part of him like this, the joining they held was not enough. She scrabbles against him inside, digging furiously, frantically reaching for the soft pulsing seed of Light she contains, heedless of his panic to stop her.

Her body is ravaged exactly as she had desired - just how long had she wanted this without knowing, this feeling of biting fangs and shredding claws. Feral satisfaction overcomes her as her center is filled with heat but it _still _is not enough. He sings out his pleasure but she wants the song to be repeated, for him to fill her again and again and_ again_ until his darkness is all she knows inside, until it drips from her and stains her for eternity.

Mortal breaths choke off and cease as the tendril around her throat tightens. The fog deepens beyond that of lust as her body grows light-headed, as in his monstrous throes he edges ever closer to snuffing her out. Yet still she does not fight him, yet still she refuses, yet still she submits. _No never will I lay a hand on you that way but I want I need I am **too small-**_

Deep within, as she tumbles into his essence, his soul where they finally, finally join, those five tethers absorb deep inside of her. Slipping around his dark tangles, she manages one last swipe at the Blessing, a twist in_ just_ the right way at the Light within, and she seizes it. Newfound might - the pieces of her other fragments melding themselves, even temporarily, to her - has her snatch the glimmering shard within her soul. She grabs it even as blackness eats at the edges of her vision in the waking world, as her vision blurs with his face the last center she sees. And she pulls it apart.

Her aether **explodes** outwards, raging, a churning firestorm, supernova finally set free. Boiling hot magma races through her limbs, tracing the path of blood and nerves and she screams in that language of time before time. Her body is _too small_ and it is within his soul that she changes first. Fragmented presence whole, whole but _different _from before. She is herself, not from ancient Amaurot but fully restored and resplendent in the sea of stars around them. Ripping through her barriers, she pulls him close to her and where the Light would burn him she _halts _it.

She tastes, smells, feels, exactly as she once did, but the overlaying tang of ozone - so much Light - hovers in the air electrically. Wings like his own, color inverted and peppering him with shedding down, fold to embrace him, to hold him in return as he held her moments ago. She shines brilliantly but does not blind him - him, only _him _\- in her love, rivalling the distant stars. The form she wears ripples, once, twice, before blurring as the change begins in the waking world.

He fills her and devours her mortal form and she is thrashing now in his hold, but not struggling from _him_. She is small, too small for the greatness inside and with an immense display of this new monstrous strength her entire body goes taut, breaking the hold of his tendrils upon her. She babbles in their tongue, words for _him _amongst the meaningless as she twists, fingers bracing upon his shoulders as her nails shoot forth to bury themselves in his flesh.

Blue-white tendrils uncoil from behind her and squirm, flailing in their search for purchase that they find upon his form. They grasp, coiling around his own appendages and sturdier limbs, lashing her to him. She grows,_ too small_ frame shedding itself as that thing welling up inside of her roars using her mouth, teeth turning to needles and knives. The wings inside are reflected outwardly as his are, half-arms graceful even as they end in scything blades. The armor she gains mirrors his own, skin luminous with silver-blue adornments.

She looks like him, now, but whether that is because her form is true now, because it is _he _who inspired this change, or the borrowed power she used to obtain it, she did not care. Leaning up she sinks her teeth into his neck, tasting that otherworldly blood of his and clawing down her throat to bare her own at him - it is the color of quicksilver, dotted with blue and gold.

**Hades, my love.**

Now, just as monstrous as he, she offers herself up.

Every part of him aches with need. It is shrill, it permeates down into the very core of his soul because it is _not enough _and though he keeps her alive to rend and tear and rip through it is not enough because she is small, and mortal, and her blood tastes of copper and minerals it is not _right _it is not _sweet _it is not _fresh green leaves and warm summers_ and yet he continues to sink his teeth in, in vain hope this time it is.

Her pleading tears at him, piercing gold eyes staring from behind a porcelain mask, waiting for her to fight back, even as breath becomes harder, harder still, all but cut off. His teeth bared he vocalizes, words gnarled by how addled he has become.

_Fight it! **Fight me!**_

It had been so long, so very long, he had almost forgot the thrill, the sheer satisfaction of _violent delights_. Even as talons cut through flesh like sharp knives and the hold on her throat threatened to erase her again, he would not _could not _ever fully put her out. Keeping her teetering, begging her to dig deep because he knew it was there to see it one more time…

Was he screaming? Was the sound physical, or aetheric? It didn’t matter because there was nothing he could do to stop her. There was never a time he had the power to do such a thing. Every fragment had wended its way around his tangled aether and he could not touch that shard to stop her himself.

**DO NOT!**

Everything was a high pitched drone, the tsunami of aether stunning him on both planes, aether pliant and body slumped against hers with a weak rumble.

Hades winced, awaiting the agony, searing burn of Light from her as aether surged, filling her veins with light and fire and her body with vigor that he’d all but ripped from her. Sinking within his soul, an endless expanse of space, a supernova found its home in that black emptiness, the only place one could ever truly belong.

And then he tastes; fresh green leaves, warmed in the summer sun. It fills his breath and even tainted by ozone the nostalgia tears through his body. He is not burning in the Light though he acutely feels its presence, he is, he is…

_Reverent._

He is still, and he is _reverent _for what else could Hades be, gazing upon the last thing he’d held onto for thousands and thousands of lifetimes. The one being as monstrous as him and so willing to revel in it with him and she was _there_. He is on his knees, the violence and writhing of his soul stilled.

Physical eyes open, taking in a sharp breath. It’s not fear he feels but pure _thrill _as her body writhes and wrests from him, negative-image tendrils unfurling to tangle with his and give her the space she _demanded_.

He is caught off-guard in his wide-eyed shock as her teeth lance through his flesh to draw viscous, inky blackness to the surface, tearing through skin and muscle and bone and he does not scream but he _moans_, reigniting the need, the absolute desperate, howling, baying shrieking _hunger _that he could have never sated with her so mortal, so frail but _now…_

Now she was not.

Her mortal name is the softest sound on his lips, rumbled at its tail as his body tremors, the last little cord he was holding onto set free as she was finally, finally his. Hades lunged forwards, his teeth sinking with no restraint into her neck, tearing through sinew and flesh, letting bright metallic blood pour from her, smearing onto the mask covering his face.

Huge sickle-shaped claws ran troughs into her back, and gold talons trailed hungrily down her body, slipping between her thighs to tease and rub with such tender care than all the rest of his actions. There is aching, searing heat settled at his pelvis, such that when she pulls him tight to her it makes him growl and press even tighter against her, a large hand gripping around her nape to hold her still as he shifts, sinking his talons into her hips and pulling her against him, growling possessively, in satisfaction as his hips push forward, claiming her again, sinking and sinking until she fits against him with exquisite perfection.

**You are mine. You will always be mine. I will make sure every. Last. One. _Knows._**

His hips surged with each phrase, and any protests or declarations of her own would have been stifled as a tendril wrested free from the grip of her own, coiling around her neck and slipping into her mouth and throat.

She is triumphant. She is whole, she is new, she is full of a boiling surge and bubbling magma and hunger that rips through her, shrieking to get out. _This is what I'm meant to be, _she crows inside, _Here like this with you in this moment._ And she is _right_. The song that sings in her blood each time combat rises, the sharp thrill of the hunt, the rush of every horrible and terrible risk she has put herself through - none of them come close to comparing. None of them satisfy her as she is now.

Blood drips from her teeth but it tastes so _sweet _because it is his, given to her in love and lust and oh, so willingly. Scything claws and deadly talons drag down his flesh, parting it like ribbons as she tears at him. As they tear at each other. As they howl and unleash the deepest parts of themselves and rip into one another like no one else would - like no other ever _could_, ever would, ever has. Metallic drips and mingles with abyssal into a beauty the stars themselves envy as they devour one another, aether of _both _now powerful enough to instantly heal all harm.

He whispers her name and rather than cool the beast within it inflames it. Ancient words of love hiss through a mouth of razors against his skin and the rumble she contained finally ripped free of her in a growl of her own. Vibrations from deep within, harmonizing with his own _finally _as they sing together _finally _and she has never felt anything more _right_.

It was revelations within and without. Inside she clutched him to her, meeting him at even footing for the first time and desperate to keep it this way, impossibly. The darkness of empty space and the explosive brilliance of a multitude of stars living together for eternity - and she _wants_. Clawed hands find his delicately - sweetness even now, love is both feral and kind - and she presses her soul to his, begging true entry now, as she is whole.

When he grabs her in the physical realm, going limp in the hold at her neck, it is no true submission, merely _trust _and _patience _and the knowledge that greater things are yet to come. The need inside her rises as he grinds them together, and as she feels him **_finally _**join them the heat in her peaks from that alone - racing through her and she tears into him yet again with a screeching yowl. They are two lost pieces finally joined, had been joined before but never like _this _never with such radiant savagery.

**Take me. Claim me. I want the world to see and to know that we are this and have always been this.**

Her tendrils lash and coil around him, feeling, grasping, no patch of skin or chitin left untouched, tantalizing. Small hands - so very close to mortal yet more than that - cup his face, brush through his shaved hair to fist against the strands with talons, silver-white brushing metal, his crown atop her King. Half-wings fold around him to pull him deliciously closer, scimitar-claws piercing deep into flesh.

The tendril that slips inside of her mouth is met with gnashing teeth, drinking deep of his lifeblood. Her tongue extends to meet it, long, a tendril of its own, wrapping around even as her maw is filled and she _moans_. He fills her and he fills her jaw and she feels his thrusting hips inside of her very _essence_. She burns with satisfaction, with rightness, with_ this is how it should be _and she knows it will be forever different for them now. But she does not **care**.

Still it is not enough, this temporary pleasure no matter how excruciatingly full of ecstasy. She wants more, _needs _more, **_hungers _**for more. For something long, something lasting, something _more_. The Light in her yearns to extinguish the dark in him yet she continues to halt it in her love as only she can. But perhaps, as he claims her, as he fills her and devours her and they devour one another, she can claim him as well.

A tendril, silver-white and blue and dripping with their combined blood, snakes its way around his body. The tip sharpens, glows, and slides into the skin of his chest. The Light should harm him but whole as she is, fiend as she is, she does not let it, and with a bellow more felt than heard she presses and flushes the Light - her light - her very soul, deep within his core. It thrashes, warm, hot - so very hot it incinerates all she commands it to - but within him it curls protectively around who he is.

Within, she begs entry to his soul once more, she wants this, wants _eternity_. Light and Dark existing within two souls, two bodies, combined in love and passion and heedless of everything that exclaims they _should not _be this way. It is a desire that transcends logic, transcends thought. It is instinctual and mortal and eternal all at once.

**Be with me now. Be with me always. Leave yourself in me. Make the world afraid of us.**

The sound Hades’ soul makes is not one kin to any mortal instrument or vocalization but it is a sound that permeates through every part of his body. She can taste it in his blood, she can hear it in his touch and it thrums through the room in perfect harmony with her own.

Silver, black, blue, gold and violet blood marble across bodies and soak into every surface it drips down onto, an impasto painting borne of monstrous, passionate love.

He is desperate, addled, fully aware for only the briefest moments as sickle claws unzip her skin from her body, waterfalls of blue marbled mercury weeping from her body in the moments the wounds remain open. His teeth sink in, reveling in the taste, the burn of light-corrupted blood as his jaw finds purchase on her collarbone, straining for just moments until it shatters, tearing bone and flesh free, light pouring from the crater in her shoulder before it heals. It had been so long, so long since he could indulge as monstrously as he felt. Thousands of years of gentle, mortal pleasures that never quite made his soul sing, as pleasant as they were.

But not even in Amaurot, not until he found _her_, did he find that satisfaction either. A monster, like him, clothed in plain skin and robes. He knew it from the moment he saw her soul, and she must have too because their eyes locked, and everything was so far away except for the pounding of his heart in his chest.

Gold-tipped hands grasp hers, weaving together as her soul sears and burns white-hot in a cold, endless expanse, as if it could illuminate the infinite blackness he contained. A moment of calm as he pushes and rolls his body against hers, such slow movement disharmonious with the frenzied tearing of flesh and bone and yet both made all the more pronounced for the difference.

He is hesitant, a tremor of fear in him as her soul pleads, so full of light and so dangerous to him, no matter how very much every nerve physically screams at him that he _should _because this is everything he could have possibly ever wanted, but it could end him so easily.

The sound dragged screaming from his throat is pure ecstasy, teeth and scythe talons shredding his body, a cascade of blood that coats his body, the slate hue of his skin rapidly taken by nebula-swirled black as her body writhes, set afire by a feral, mortal climax.

Nothing would be the same after this. She had seen almost all of what he was and what he wanted and what _he is,_ beneath the skin of his vessel. Beneath the skin of his own. He will sit beside her, taste her soul and feel only this monstrous, hideous hunger that only she could understand.

Shaking breath washes over her hands as taloned fingers cradle his jaw, coated in blood that is hers, and his, and sprayed onto the white mask where dimly glowing eyes regard her with a look that could only ever be described as _devotion_. The movement of her fingers soothes him, a step back from being lost in his monstrousness entirely.

Then scythe talons sink in, pulling his body tighter, rending flesh from bone and he _snarls_, pinning her against the wall, the sound of plaster crumbling and wood shattering little more than a footnote in the monstrous, hedonistic yowls and snarling the two share, the thrust of his hips vicious, wanting, selfish in how he chases his own ecstasy, the tendril in her mouth sinking deeper down her throat as it fills with freely pouring blood. His body tenses, pressing his forehead into her shoulder so hard his mask cracks, and she feels searing heat filling her, pouring across every needing, wanting inch of flesh within her. Claws and talons tear through her body, catching on sinew and bone and ripping it from her body as he claims her for it is not by _mortal _means he does so, but by aether; icy darkness that feels heavy, and solid within her, carried so intimately there would be no question, with those with the sight to see, how she became infused this way.

Hades has but one fear; the light itself. The damnable presence that tore his love’s soul into shreds and makes his own burn like no fire ever could. Which is why as the sharp tip of a tendril sinks down through his skin his soul keens in horror, for how could she betray him so, once again?

But it doesn’t burn. It doesn’t wash away all the darkness, all of _him_. It does not dare. It sears his body, blood hissing and steaming away around where she has pierced him, and he feels how of its own the Light would erase him in a moment. Yet she does not allow it, instead, it settling around the core of who he is as she pleads, again, to allow her, whole and complete, to be with him here, as well.

He is still, holding onto her with four clawed limbs and four smooth tendrils, panting hot breaths against her shoulder.

Eyes close, and his soul _yields_, the shell he had put around it disappearing and allowing her not just within it, but to be part of it. He is monstrous. He is infinite. There is no place deeper for her to go beyond here, and he allows it wholeheartedly. Her light could burn him up. She could devour him and there would be nothing left for she was always, always more monstrous than he could ever dream to be.

Things would not, could not be the same after this and the thought brought him only the deepest sense of pleasure, vocalizing it in a low, growling moan as she plunged into his soul.

**My dear monster…** he croons softly, throat hoarse and full of marbled silver and abyssal blood.

They are _resplendent _in their harmony. Dark and light and white and black and silver and gold, and together they blend without overtaking the other. The lashing thing inside her croons, because this, _this _is what peace is. Bathing in the blood of the one she loves even as her own mingles hotly. As he breaks her and rips her to pieces even as she repairs the damage, as she does the same to him. She holds to her sanity by barest inches even as she watches him fly apart, pleasured by his fury and ferocity and that **she **was the cause.

All her life the thrill of combat pushed her ever onwards. It was what she was _good _at, how she excelled. And here she knows why. This monstrosity that is her, even greater than he as she allows him to savage her. His darkness is cold where it touches her, and she knows with a thought she could end him as he could have ended her mortal life in an instant. But she does not. Despite how they tear into one another there is **love **and **trust **and it is with that knowledge she delves deep into his soul.

They mingle even fully within, hands and wings and legs and tendrils blending amongst that aetherical canvas and birthing nebulas, black holes, new stars, brilliantly luminous but also darkly abyssal. Her supernova bursts forth again where it contacts his supermassive event horizon, their combined selves settling into a quasar and _still _she refuses to overtake him. It is but a moment, and all is still within - equilibrium with the both of them intact.

Sudden movement is no shock to her as he slams her bodily, seeking his own release yet giving, ever giving to her. They are beasts, they are feral, they are every nightmare told to every child as her bladed claws grip him and fracture bone, splintering through to let the pitch within see the light of day. The tendril in her mouth is a pleasure but she desires something else, she is _hungry_, so with an inhuman crack she unhinges her jaw and bites down to sever it. Stygian fluid fountains over her dusted with the blood of stars and she swallows his flesh and slakes her thirst until it heals. Free of it, she lunges for his shoulder, flaying him bare and feasting. He is but ever sweet.

The heat rises, high, higher, scorching her from within but even so it is paltry compared to the flood within her as he tenses and crushes her body to his. She feels the icy aether making its way inside, formed yet pliable, sitting within her most intimate of places and delivered there by nightmarish means. But she embraces it, embraces him leaving _himself _in her, and the frigid chill against the searing heat of all she is causes her to come crashing down a third time in euphoria.

Time stops for her.

Tender, taloned hands find his in the depths within themselves. In that impossible mix of Light and Dark. No more barriers - never again shall there be barriers. And though she will not be as she is now, _Whole_, forever, she knows that she could be again. As she is, not as she once was.

The room is silent save for the two thrumming notes coming from deep within their bodies. The frantic feast has abated, hunger sated, and she holds him with tendrils and arms, legs wrapped around him where they are still joined intimately. She holds tighter, not crushing, not hungry but sated, simply reveling in her closeness with him. She feels him inside of her, body and soul, and she can feel the part of herself that now resides within him.

She kisses him, both their maws full of fangs but this time it is achingly tender, pouring not frantic lust but **_love _**through in the way only they two can behold. Damn destiny, damn all others who would condemn _this_. Nothing shall be the same and it is _right _that it shall be so.

He croons to her and she smiles against his lips, her eyes shining with light as they meet his own.

**Yours. Ever yours. Through time and Light and Dark**, she purrs, bubbled through love and violence, and more beautiful for it.

He is...vulnerable. In a way she never would have seen or even conceived of him being capable of and as her soul and the Light threatens to overwhelm him for moments before finding balance, he understands. How she could have offered herself so willingly and completely, before she even found what she was beneath all that soft skin and weak muscle. In her grip his muscles are sliced through and his bones strain and shatter and he feels...light. She could end him. Pull the breath from his body. Burn away his soul. She could erase him and as vulnerable as he is, his soul not just tangled with hers but _part of it, now,_ he would allow it gladly.

Within he embraces her, a frantic tangle of him craving to be closer, closer, closer still, a scrambled desire to consume and be consumed, to become so completely united and yet-

_Nothing can be the same after this_, he thinks to himself, the clearest thought he’s had since she shattered Her Blessing. He does not know if he feels dread or excitement. He is bare to her and all these feelings are plain to her as if he was speaking aloud, and the feelings he is so conflicted by are washed away by the incandescent light of stars and seas of nebulae he is surrounded by. She is surrounded by. _They _are surrounded by, for it is them and only them, together, that could ever produce a night sky as magnificent as this.

Brought back to physical by the pain of teeth sinking through, severing the tendril in her throat, he makes a strangled sound, his breath catching once twice before the moaning howl wrests itself free from his chest, a dissociative bliss as her teeth sink into his shoulder and gorge on the star-scattered pitch of his flesh. He feels his body on fire, and his hips give a slow lurching thrust as she tears a second orgasm from him.

This time, his teeth do not rip through flesh and bone and his claws do not do more than anchor themselves in her flesh as he lets her feast on him. He feels...bliss. She is here, whole, even if only for the moment, but he loves her, the mortal of now and not just seeking his spouse of eld. Tendrils coil and wrap around her body if only to hold her tighter, hold more of her as he growls lowly, possessively, _tiredly_. It is the first time in thousands of years he can recall being _satiated_, groaning as her teeth rip flesh from bone again and again until she slows...and stops.

_Nothing can be the same after this._ He pushes the thought to the side.

His lips eagerly meet hers, tasting his own bitter, floral blood on her, pulling gilded talons from her legs to cradle her chin, mouthing softly at her bottom lip, the action so delicately mortal after what felt like an eternity of feral, monstrous lust and yet, it made him feel as much as any other hunger slaked. There was nobody else for him, nobody else as monstrous as him, nobody else that could be monstrous _together _with him and he would find her every time.

He pushes the ruined, shattered remnants of his mask from his face. There is reverence in his eyes, pulling talons and claws from her body, lustful, hungering touch replaced by gentle strokes through viscous silver and abyssal pitch. His soul sings in euphoria, and the shimmer of stars in his blood responds in kind. Endless. Infinite. Eternal in soul and body, a vast nothingness, filled only with distant stars.

**My beautiful monster. How I have waited, so, so long to sing with you again,** he lilts, soft tender motions, both beasts coated thickly in each other’s blood, bellies full of stolen flesh.

_Nothing can be the same after this._

Hades accepts it, untroubled.

He revels in it for as long as he can, pressing his forehead to hers, silent save for the low rumble in his chest, a stillness and peace he cannot remember the last time he felt. He does not care to think about a time where he may not feel it again, because she is here. The hero. _His hero._

A hush has fallen around the room, tranquility made more potent for the raging furor that tore them apart even moments ago. Her glowing eyes slide shut as she returns the pressure of her forehead to his, breath coming in soft puffs as it ghosts along his lips. Silver claws from four arms wander, tracing gentle patterns, merely savoring the feel of every inch of him. Memorizing this form of his, enjoyment for enjoyment's sake, she so rarely indulges in things just for her and she knows he will not begrudge her this.

Her legs still wrap around him, keeping them joined at their hips, tendrils holding him close. She's not keen on separating them just yet. The fog and haze of lust and hunger has lifted, and in its place is a blanket of love and peace that she has never known until this moment - fulfilled, every urge she has ever known or wanted, and some she had not, satisfied. She whispers to him, voice made musical with love and the sharing of one another.

**My dearest Darkness. I am sorry to keep you waiting**, ancient tongue spilling from her lips easily. **Do not despair, I know you now, as I always have. We will sing together once more, soon.** Because she knows that even this cannot last forever, the borrowed power even now trembles within her - it is rightfully hers, truly, but not yet. Still, they are given this time together, time to spend under this blanket of care and love after the pitched monstrous gorging, and she feels naught but gratitude.

But she does not cling to the feeling of being _whole_, and when the five facsimiles within her shudder, buck at her yoke and pull away from her, she allows them to go. Five tethers slip away, painlessly, a soft untangling from both him and her, and streak back into the rift from whence they came. She braces herself slightly, but it is not a sudden lurching but a slow, gradual thing.

She feels it within first, the pulsing Blessing she had pulled apart, manipulated until it had cracked to allow her to grow, begins to coalesce once more. It is warm, within her, a soft beat similar to that of her own heart, and she is ready to pull away should it reach for him. But it does not. It remains within her, obeying her as she commanded the Light before, and she feels it as she feels the light she had joined to him. All part of her, now, pieces of her fragmented whole.

The tapestry they have woven in the sky remains, even as she becomes smaller once again. No longer _too small _but _as she is now_ and yet it does not feel like a loss. She has felt what she can become, what she _is _deep within, and is content in that knowledge. Yet still they do not separate. Whatever powers which could have kept them apart do not act, and they remain joined in their very souls. She, smaller now, cradled by him and lacking her wings and arms and tendrils but still just as fused as before. The light she filled him with pulses softly, coiling around him, a permanent protective resident in his core of aether and physical both. Only with him could it be thus, she knows. Only ever **him**.

_Nothing can be the same after this_. A shared thought. Perhaps this is a new truth for them. That, mortal as she is, they can have this. That for once fate may treat them kindly, that they may be so lucky.

Smaller arms hold him close along with legs as her physical form slowly sheds its monstrousness. The swelling thing recedes in her, inevitable like the tide, and she feels it curl up inside - not gone, but patiently waiting until she may make use of it again. She cannot help but enjoy how much larger he is than she, now that she is clothed in mere mortal flesh once more. Her fingers, clawless now, trace over his face, his crown, his nape, and she is held aloft by him and his many grips alone.

And still, they are joined intimately. Her smile is bright as she looks him in the eyes, pressing a soft kiss to his mouth and pulling in her first mortal breath in what feels like days. Minutes, hours, days, how long had they feasted? It did not matter, her belly was full, her lustful hunger sated, and lower still she was full of _him_, of solid aether left by _him _and there was no physical pleasure greater for her, in these moments.

"Well, my love, you certainly kept me entertained," the words are a hoarse, broken whisper and a huff of laughter, her mortal form sore and strained in every way but she cannot bring herself to care.

To describe silence as deafening appears at a glance, an oxymoron. But it is. It truly is. The silence is broken only by shivering breaths and the slow drip of blood from furniture to floor. In this moment all his power is but a single speck of sand, and it is audible in the way his breath shakes, four limbs holding her protectively, securely to him.

Within, the empty void of nothingness, a galaxy without light is blooming, finally illuminated after thousands and thousands of years again. He is an architect and yet he could not build alone, mortar without bricks. He had always needed her in all his years, and Amaurot would not have been half as grand without her influence. It would have been an empty blackness. A galaxy without stars.

He cradles her face and there is pain in his eyes as he hears her words and feels her borrowed shards breaking away, placing a soft kiss on her forehead, a faint rumble as he closes his eyes and allows each shard to flitter away, weaving and curling around his aether as they disappear back to whence they came, the faintest tethers remaining, a reminder that she can be this, again, with him, not incomplete, brok-

Hades does not think on it further.

If he had come to accept his fate, or simply trusted her that deeply is hard to say, as the shards of Hydaelyn’s blessing coalesce, watching as her beautiful, monstrous form scatters and fades inwardly at first, restrained once again by Her presence. He is ready to spit acerbic words, he feels his aether start to prickle...and then it is gone. He is intact, he is safe and he does not feel fear of She who sundered all creation.

And she, she is small, and mortal, and his.

Never anything but a monster wrapped in fragile mortal form, he remains _this_, within. There is no form for his soul to return to, for it has always been monstrous, always a beast of nightmares. He sees the stars around him, and how they remain, and realizes maybe they can have at least this. They can at least be night and stars, brick and mortar, a decorated filigree of aether.

He feels her so acutely now, with the not-quite-burning of light within his body, a persistent static tingle that curls and squeezes and he realizes they have anchored and woven themselves together in aether, in soul, always able to share this space, able to reach and touch and embrace and...His heart beats faster at the notion, pounding in his chest.

Hades opens his eyes. She is small, and mortal, and her body presses tight against his, around him, making him shudder and arch his spine, claws barely missing her to instead rake through furniture, floor and walls. His breath is heaving, sharp as he revels, crooning to the air as he accustoms to the not-quite-fit of her small, mortal body.

Finally calm enough to wrap arms and tendrils around her, he presses his lips to her shoulder, tongue slipping out to lap sanguine marbling from her skin, grooming her with a soft trill, revealing faint marks on her shoulder and neck, black-violet shimmers where his teeth had torn her body apart.

Taloned fingers wipe abyssal pitch and quicksilver from her face, and he looks at her in a way where he finally sees her as she is, no longing for something more complete, no pining for a person she no longer is, and she is, she is…

**Beautiful.**

Holding her snugly to him still, he shifts, turning them both so he leans against the wall, able to sit with her straddled across him, shuddering with each movement as the two remain quite snugly, intimately joined, his claws working yet more furrows into stone and wood in place of her delicate body.

**I am yours. I will always be yours. And every last one will know.**

His hands rest at her hips and a thumb slowly presses over the light outward curve just above her pelvis, rattling a sound that is monstrous and _thrilled_. Another slow rub of his thumb and the coalesced, solidified darkness carried intimately by her shifts slightly. His excitement is electrifying, and the smirk on his face is perhaps the most self-satisfied he’s ever looked. Joined as they are, she feels the greedy, devilish thoughts racing through him, that he would do it again. He would fill her _more _and oh how he would delight in seeing her that way.

Lips meet hers so softly, so gently, closing his eyes to sink himself into the moment, even as he feels his exhaustion setting in, his monstrous body starting to fall away from him like autumn leaves in the wind, but only outwardly; inwardly he remains the same beast as ever.

He loves her. He loves her. _He loves her_ and it’s a feeling he thought he had forgotten and it makes him dizzy and makes him want to lavish every kiss he’d missed for thousands of years on her, every gentle touch, every shared bed. His mundane body’s heart is beating, pounding so hard a hand to his chest would find it palpable to touch.

The next time his eyes open, his skin, albeit coated in starry pitch, is pale and untanned. His hands - soft, mortal hands - resting on her hips, her legs still wrapped tight around him. He tries to talk, once, twice in the wrong language, the look on her face showing her confusion. Allagan? No, that’s not it. Garlean? No, no, still not right.

Eorzean is the next language that spills from his mouth. “My love,” he starts, his aether practically bursting with thrill as he speaks so candidly. “My love, would you imply that I am a liar? I have never spoken anything but the truth. Did I not also say that these things never end in a tidy way for you?” He motions to the sanguine tapestry of the bed, the wall, the steady creep of it across the floor.

Emet-Selch is _exhausted_, and he tries to prattle, teasingly, in that way that he does, that he knows rubs her the wrong way just to see her react, but he doesn’t have the strength of will to do so. Instead, he pulls her close to him, sighing contently and smiling, lopsidedly.

“Look at what a mess I’ve made of you, hero.”

With their new position, she shifts her legs to get her knees beneath her body, still straddling his lap, still joined. She feels the shift of darkness within her, and finds the thought he chases as he strokes her abdomen pleasing. He would fill her more, would he? Perhaps she desired that, as well, sated as she is. His delight is echoed in her own, but she files that thought away for the moment as he kisses her, mortal guise returning to him. His love causes her soul to sing through their bond, a rejoicing note awash with her own love for him.

His words pull a chuckle from her, rasping, and she closes the distance to rest her head upon his. That he would give not one but two false starts prior to speaking causes her pride to rise in her breast, for only through these very actions could she have done so. But then again, perhaps she could press him more? The thought appeals to her, of Emet-Selch, wordless entirely due to _her _and she smiles, eyes meeting gold.

"You did indeed, though I find that I cannot complain about the methods. In fact, I rather enjoyed them," there is a curl to her lips, a purr in her voice, for she is a feline that supped on cream and canary both. And she found that she rather did enjoy it. Such an exertion would not be possible every day - she does not know how often she may be able to reach out as she had - but that it _will _be possible again thrills her.

The blatant affection in her voice shows her appreciation of his honesty, of his admission of love for her, as she loves him. "It appears we have made a mess of one another," spoken against his skin as she leans to lick starlight from his shoulder. His taste is intoxicating, yet she is so satisfied it does not spur her on further, serving only to deepen her contentment. As she cleans, small patches of silvery-white that shimmer blue in the light are revealed, directly where she had feasted upon him. They scatter about his neck, his shoulder, his collar, numerous enough that attempts to conceal them would be fruitless.

"Mm, I find I quite like this," her voice has the faintest edge of growling, the monster within is pleased. "All will know you are mine now, with how I've claimed you. Marked you up for me and me alone." One of her hands traces where he had supped upon her, feeling the slightly smoother texture of his own black-violet marks. Her smile is full of teeth, "And you've marked me as yours, good. Had you not, I would have been forced to take other measures to show the world I am yours."

Her earlier thought occurs to her, and though the slavering monster inside is completely sated with her fullness, though she can see how _exhausted _he may be, she desires more from him. She loves him, and monster as she is, she wants to see him be taken apart. Not by gibbering frenzied lust, but by a slow pleasure - one she can give him as a mortal, as she is now.

She can see exactly how tired he is, and she knows she will derive no pleasure of her own, but still she gives her hips a roll. Once, twice, before raising herself up and back down. She is slick with her own fluids and with his, the slide in and out coming easy despite the soreness in her form. As she moves him within her, she can feel the pliant darkness shift, and she knows he feels the same thing. The monster within croons softly, sighing aloud as her lips part and she begins a slow ride, an even pace, making mortal love to him and locking onto his eyes as she does so.

"Can you claim me one last time, my beast? Do you have the strength?" it is a taunt, it is a tease, from one monster to another and oh, how she wants him to. Wants to be even more full of him, of him from this mortal guise as well as the shifting darkness within. Her lips ghost over his, "My dearest Darkness."

There is a slow and smug curl on his lips, eyes half lidded, fully leaning back against the wall. His breath has calmed slightly, though he still takes deep, sometimes shivering breaths as he tries to get his wits about him, lest he be caught unable to trade quips with his lover. His exhaustion is palpable outwardly, his aether retreated within his body fully, still smoldering but no longer raging and out of control.

Either he does not notice or care as his thoughts drift, his thumb still lazily stroking across her belly, little static shocks of delight sparking through his body. “I aim to please, my dear warrior.” He is practically slurring, but still managing to look all the world like he is the one that came out on top. He would have himself believe this wholly, in fact.

The muscles in his back and shoulders stiffen as she leans in, laving tongue across intact but still sore skin, revealing the ink-wash staining of where his throat, his shoulder and collar were ravaged. It is not the first time he has had aether scarring, but it has been so very, very long. So tired he is that her words leave him momentarily without words, a crimson hue blooming across his cheeks and ears. Within, he trills helplessly. Yes, he is hers. He was always hers. He was never for anybody else. _Everybody will see that he belongs to her and her alone._ He has nothing to say with his voice, but his body _reacts _with fervor, firm flesh still intimately embraced by her twitching with the thrill of it.

His love-struck silence is broken as her hips roll against him, making him gasp and shiver. “Ah, what…” he murmurs, as she shifts and rocks against him, sinking herself against him in a slow, teasing pace. “What are you, oh, what are you doing,” he manages to stammer out. He is _exhausted _and yet his body yearns for this, once more. His fingers grip and paw at her hips and sides, occasionally catching her skin with a gilded talon, barely formed. His head tips back and he lets out a soft, breathy sound of delight, snapping at the air as his hips push to meet hers snugly.

Afterimages of extra arms, tendrils and crown seem to flicker around him, deep, thrumming growls wresting free from his throat. He is trying to muster that body again, but he hasn’t the strength to do so. Her teasing words push him practically to the edge of changing again but he can barely change a single hand let alone his entire body.

_Mine_. The monster snarls, inside. He cannot bring it to the fore. _Mine_. His fingers curl and nails scrape at her back uselessly, mortally. _Mine_. He cannot look at her in the eye, knowing it will unravel him in a moment, and he does not want her to have that power. Any _more _power over him than she already has. _Mine_. His back arches, cursing soft, mortal flesh in a language she cannot identify, and then bowing his spine, his head dipping low. **Mine**. Oh, he tries, he tries to muster himself monstrously, blunt Garlean teeth nipping sharply at her shoulder. **Mine. **A hand slides from her back to her neck, gripping softly, his thumb rubbing firmly at her throat, an abyssal growl rising from his body. **Mine**. The other hand slides down to grope at the curve of her waist, the weight held just beyond skin, and the feel of it pressing against him makes the hand around her neck squeeze tighter._ Mine. Mine. **Mine.**_

As his gaze lifts, her eyes find his.

** _Yours._ **

He can no longer hear for the pounding of his heart in his chest. His lips meet hers bruisingly, his tongue seeking hers, his fingers letting go of her throat, tangling into her hair and gripping it tight. It is not with a monstrous snarl or even the sultry moan of an emperor that Emet-Selch is undone, but a soft mewl of ecstasy, his hips rising, pleading for her to stay so tightly pressed against him, shivering as heat floods her core again, filling her in a more _mortal _fashion.

He breaks the kiss to press his forehead to her shoulder, riding out this last peak, his body twitching with each electric aftershock, forcing air from his throat in sharp rasps.

There are no words in his head. No witty responses. No overwrought teases. He is Solus zos Galvus, he is Emet-Selch, he is Hades and he is _spent._

He touches and gropes, caresses and grasps, nips and scratches that pale in comparison to what they have just shared but are all the more intimate for what they mean. This is what she had desired, to see him fall apart completely, to see him seek to claim her even as she claims him this last time. And when the edge of pleasure inevitably comes for him, as he pulls her close and thrusts deep, the sound he makes is one she will remember for _eternity_. She was able to do this, mortal as she was. To bring him this, to have him trust her so.

She stills in her actions, having milked every last drop she could of him - provided every last ounce of pleasure he could stand, every measure of this joining of theirs that he had been missing. That she, too, had been missing without ever knowing so. He was so exhausted and yet underneath her he tries to rise once more, unable to do so, and the thrill that brings her surprises even her. To have pushed him, so mighty in his energy and will, to where he squirms and shudders under her, completely in her power, is glorious.

Inside, she rejoices, unable and _unwilling _to hide all she feels from him. How she treasures him, this monster she has made hers - but not tamed, never that, she would not stand for it - how she loves him more deeply than should be possible. That they feel this together, that they are able to with that magnificent night sky in their souls, even though what has become of the both of them should make it _impossible _to do so, makes her smile in triumph. Damn his tempering, her Blessing, for they are joined and they are part of one another and they _love _so deeply and fiercely that she will rip apart those who would deny this. She was always good at breaking boundaries. All of this and more echoes softly through him, her loving resolve coming to the fore.

They have finished, now, both of them, and she feels when the waves of pleasure finally cease. She can feel him softening within her, spent and utterly content, and she chuckles, pressing a kiss to the side of his head even as he gasps against her shoulder. For the moment she keeps them joined, taking the time to gaze upon their surroundings. The sight of shredded bedding greets her, fabrics torn and stained beyond repair. The bed itself is quite ruined, that it has fallen to pieces is amazing with the splintered wood and immense troughs gouged along it. The wall, too, has broken, great pieces of stone turned to powder and gravel from even greater claws. All around them the collateral is easily seen, not to mention the lake of otherworldly vital fluid that still slowly spreads, and she is pleased.

He shivers against her, and it is her turn to care for him. She lifts herself from his lap, knowing he is powerless to stop her, finally feeling him slide out of her. The loss would normally be keenly felt, after so long joined together, but she does not feel thus. She is full of him, of his mortal release and of that dark aether placed to claim her, and she smiles down at him. Even now, it sits cold in her, and like the Light she had filled his being with, she can feel it slowly absorbing into her being. It will become a part of her forever, a place of shade within her brilliance.

Heedless of the incredible mess they have made of one another, of their surroundings, she moves to lay down amongst what remains of blankets and pillows. He is pliant putty, and she whispers wordless chirps of devotion as she pulls him to her, gathering him close. It is time to nest, now that she is his and he is hers. Time to bask in the destruction of this room, of the claiming of one another. **Mine. Yours.**

"I will end all who try to take you from me, my dear Hades," the words are fervent, whispered to him in body and soul. "Even the Gods themselves."

And in her monstrous savagery, she would.

It is some time before his breaths slow, fingers uncurling from her hair and sliding down her blood-slicked shoulders, leaning back but not without trailing soft, adoring kisses on her shoulder, her jaw and her lips as he does so. She can see in the way his lips move that he is trying to say...something. Some sarcastic remark, a barbed tease...but no, nothing is heard. He gives up, tipping his head back to rest on the gouged wall, an exhausted, blissful smile illuminating his face.

Far from tame indeed, but quelled into soft rumbling purrs, just for her, _only for her,_ and nobody else. There is no other he would trust so wholly, so devotedly, that he would be openly weak before. That he would allow even the smallest shard of light to take residence in his body after so many hundreds of thousands of lifetimes of it being diligently kept an endless, starless void.

He inspects his hands, much like every other part of him and her, covered in a tapestry of eldritch blood. Thoughts race through him, even now, of teasing her further, lapping blood from his fingers...but they drop listlessly to his sides, resting on top of her thighs. No, he hasn’t the strength. He is barely conscious, and each time his eyes lid, it is for a little longer.

The softest sounds of complaint come from his throat as she moves, sore, tender, not wanting to leave that intimate embrace. But he is powerless to stop her as he leaves soft kisses, brushes of his lips on any part of her that moves close enough, allowing him to be pulled into her embrace on the ruined bedding, a sea of stars and silver nebulae that they nest in. He tucks his head beneath her chin, arms slung around, legs tangled together, wanting to feel her as closely as he does within; a beast doting upon his small mate, showering her with affection, delicate despite all his tremendous strength and size hidden beneath mortal skin.

No, things cannot be the same, and for now, Emet-Selch; Hades does not care. He is in _love _and this is all that matters. The only thing that could possibly ever matter. So strong it is that it drowns out the howling of a greedy god. He does not doubt her for a moment. He does not doubt her and he does not dare speak, nor even fully think of all he has done for her. For this moment to even come to pass.

He speaks her name, softly, the only words from his mouth in what he feels is a lifetime. It is the only words he speaks, for there are no others he knows in any language that could convey how he feels, so instead, his aether tangles with hers and sings.

The fingers of his right hand flex and curl, middle finger pressing against thumb.

His eyes shut. His wrist falls slack. He is gone from the waking world, asleep on a bed of sanguine stars.

But still his soul sings.

He sings to her. He sings to her and she answers, two voices harmonizing in a melody forgotten by time. Even when she no longer concentrates on it, the song continues, tangled with his aether and sinking deep into her core. Perhaps the music would never end, a forever backdrop to her existence, and that thought does not bother her in the slightest.

She feels it when he eases into true sleep, his body relaxing just that final remnant more. So much had happened, this night. She had rediscovered a part of herself that she had never known. Suspected, perhaps, with the way the thrill of battle strikes somewhere deep in her breast, with the way she felt when he would look at her with those golden eyes. This discovery, and all that came from it, well. It would change everything. She finds she does not mind. Not when she has him. When he has her. And she doubts that the ones she cares for will mind, as long as she is safe and it is of her own volition.

Exhaustion seeps through her body, as she lays entwined with her lover. Still, she keeps a vigil, for a time, basking in the afterglow. Habit born of long years of travel combined with these new instincts of a newly nesting beast, and she follows them as she always have - they have never led her wrong. And so, she keeps a vigil, listening to the soft, slow breathing of the man, the monster, _her _monster next to her. His face is peaceful in sleep, and his soul, for once, is as well. It may be the first time in eons to be so, and she holds him tighter at the thought.

Eventually, though, she lets her eyes slip closed. She follows him into the dreaming dark, as she will follow him in all things from now until eternity.

Soft singing is the first thing he’s aware of when he stirs from his deeply unconscious slumber. It is good, and pleasant, and he feels he is still dreaming, particularly when the scent of fresh leaves and sweet floral fruit fill his nose.

_Sweet floral fruit._

_Fresh leaves._

He knows these scents and his eyes open with a nervous flutter of his lashes. There is half-dried, tarry blood everywhere. Coating him, coating her, making it hard to move as he tries to ascertain-

_Is she still breathing?_

He listens. He hears soft breath, soft singing inside, inside her….and him. Things are hazy, as he tries to put together the hours blurred by absolute feral, monstrous <strike>lust</strike> love. He had let himself loose, completely, his eyes staring at the ink-stain aether scarring on her shoulder. A mild grunt of discomfort pushes free of his chest as he looks at his hands, slate grey hue creeping up them, fingers curling into talons...he flexes them, concentrating, pulling himself back in control. He is Emet-Selch, he is not a feral beast, he is…

Looking at her again, slumbering, she is fine, and safe, and he has not harmed her as far as he can see. He tries to move, pulling himself free of sticky, starry and metallic blood, sitting up in the ruins of the bed, looking now at the furrows gouged into the walls and floor, and he queries himself within; finding a beast contentedly sleeping, overwhelmed with adoration, with love, suffused but not _infected _with light, and how the nebulous void has now filled with stars for the first time in thousands of years.

She had found _him_, and similarly shown herself monstrously, once more. He found reassurance in that but it gnawed at him, worrying that she may not know fully what she has done. His gaze returns to her sleeping body, blanketed in starry pitch and she is...beautiful. He feels it outwardly as he does inwardly. He lifts a hand, grimacing on instinct at the sight of his own blood as it pulls strings between his palm and the bed.

_This is…_

_Disgusting?_

**No.**

_No. This is...fine._

His thoughts are disharmonious as he tries to consolidate the multitudes that he is; monstrous, mundane, mortal, Emperor, Ascian, Architect. He hears his name faintly murmured within the sea of stars, and he nods slowly. That’s who he’s only ever wanted to be.

He watches her quietly, his thoughts stilled just for now, waiting for her to stir.

Sleep leaves her slowly, awareness returning to her sense by sense as she rouses. The lingering scent of their lovemaking mingles with the individual fragrances of their blood, and she finds the combination pleasant. Akin to a garden, she thinks, intimacy in a garden, and she takes a deeper breath to savor it. That song, their song, still calls softly within her, and her lips tilt upwards at the wash of love she feels to hear it. His breathing sounds further away than she would like, no longer with the depth of sleep, and he is indeed no longer pulled snugly against her in contented rest. A pity. She had been very comfortable.

She takes stock of how she feels next, noting the soreness and exhaustion present in her muscles. It is the hallmark of extensive physical activity alone, no further injury pains her. Still, the burn is sweet as she makes to stretch languidly, luxuriously. The still-drying blood clings to her, and she feels the stickiness over her entire body as the blood and other fluids coat her form. A visceral sense of pleasure, of the nonsexual variety, flits through her at the feeling of fullness and coolness in her lower abdomen. He had left his mark on her, as he had claimed, and all who had that sense will see.

Finally, she opens her eyes, to see Emet-Selch looking down at her. She smiles up at him, perfectly content to lay in her nest, surrounded by the evidence of their bonding.

"Hello, monster mine," she purrs, voice still thick with sleep.

His fingers are gentle in their touch as she wakes, almost afraid that the slightest contact will break her, or...worse, somehow. As she stretches he feels that contented delight ripple through him and for a second, he panics, head and heart at odds with each other as one satisfied and peaceful and the other is _shrieking _that this is _bad _and he needs to fix it but _fix what?_

_Look at what I’ve done._

**She is mine.**

His breathing is shallower than it should be as he tries to keep his distress inside. The sight of his own blood simultaneously disgusts and horrifies him but a complete breakdown is kept in check only by the scent of fresh leaves and swirls of silver. She was _like him_ and it was glorious and he was...free. She is safe, and okay, and she is _smiling at him and she is calling him a monster, **her monster-**_

Cherry red aether swells and blankets around her possessively, safely, protectively, pulling her up onto him and pressing his lips to hers, still tasting the last of abyssal blood on her, at odds with himself as he rumbles a low purr while his mind recoils.

He is without speech for a long time. Far too long a time for Emet-Selch. When he speaks, his voice is low and gravelly; it is Hades’ voice. It is _relief _in his intonations, accented with a shaky outward breath.

“You are alright…”

The discordance amongst his thoughts and feelings dispels the lingering traces of sleep throughout her mind. It was strange, that he would be conflicted about everything, but the panic he feels is known to her and concern shows on her features. Why be torn about this? It did not make sense to her.

But when he pulls her to him she returns his kiss sweetly, keenly feeling the clash of heart and mind within him. It isn't until he speaks, finally, that she understands why. How long had he been alone, in this? Without her to revel in his true self? What terrible things could have happened in his loneliness and isolation? She had nothing but this instance, full of love and lust and bonding, but he...well. If he is in disbelief, perhaps she must remind him.

"I am, my love. Do you not remember?" she moves to press her forehead to his briefly before pulling back so that she may look him in the eyes. She is steady, in her love and affection for him, undercurrent of_ you are mine, too,_ whispered clear for him.

“I remember…” he trails off. What did he remember? He woke up and he had relaxed _too much_, and she was so curious, and his thoughts had begun to cascade into _hunger_. Relentless, monstrous hunger that he remembers feasting through, his tongue remembering the taste of copper giving way for green, summery warmth. But she was still here, she was _alive _which...he force the memories down forcibly. How? _How is she alive?_

His eyes look here and there as he tries to solidify the sequence of events, eventually settling on the light silvery-blue glimmer of scarring on his shoulder, just the same as on hers. His brow furrows as memories filter in, but a distillate that lacks an entire picture. The ecstasy of having _his _bones broken, the gleeful joy of another, like him, a void filled with stars...it’s hazy. But the pieces are falling into place. It is not like the _other times._ A monster croons inside him even though his thoughts are jumbled. But she is there, in front of him, safe and unharmed despite everything.

“It’s...so much a blur. It always is.”

Calmer though, his gaze meets hers, squeezing her leg lightly. **Hers.**

He cannot disagree, for it is the only thing that sits right with him in this moment.

His mind was ever one of the things that drew her to him. The way it was always working, ferreting out information, drawing new conclusions, the cleverness paired with an intelligent wit and creative streak. She watches it work now, as he attempts to piece their fervent activities together. She watches as he only manages moderate success.

Shifting so that she nestles against him more comfortably, the warmth of his hand on her thigh is a nice contrast to the coolness in her belly, and she sighs contentedly. The calm that spreads through him eases her concern somewhat, but something still rumbles deep within her. She wanted him to be able to recall every moment they had shared, in crystal clarity, as she could.

A test, first. She conjures up the vision of his great wings, catching the air after she had crooned his name, her love for him, in that ancient tongue, cradling her - mortal and small - within the plane of their souls. She fixes the image in her mind and impresses everything she has seen, felt, heard, in that moment. All senses, all emotions, and through their bond tries to present it all to him.

"I could show you, if you wished," her eyes meet his, patient and waiting.

His panic is but a simmer now, digging within, and only finding an unhelpful slumbering monster. Fingers roam idly as he does, his other arm loosely draping across her, rumbling as the lingering scent of fresh, sun-warmed leaves fills his nose. It’s an extraordinary peace it brings him, and faint, dreamlike memories surface, pushed to the fore by that feeling of falling, falling, wings unfurling and catching the air in a starless void.

Hades remembers; it is not a sudden, vicious or traumatic thing, it is like watching the sunset, the sky giving way for freckles of stars, slow and steady and wondrous. Mind and soul reconcile, and he is both mortal and monstrous, hidden beneath soft skin. The way his eyes slide to hers, relieved but with that same gaze he had given her just before he had shed his guise. She is here, she is safe, she had _surrendered _to him and even when she was so small and mortal, before she was even feasting upon him in turn, he could not mortally wound her. He disallowed himself to do so long before Hydaelyn could have done so more severely.

The lopsided smile he gives says plenty enough, but he speaks anyway. “Ah, my dear monster…Pray forgive me for my poor memory, and pray forgive, I cannot bear to be lounging in my own blood but a second more.”

His fingers snap, and the garden-scented lake of marbled blood is gone, relaxing far more now that it is out of sight.

“I remember, my love. I _remember us_, and I curse myself for...following old habits.” His lips meet hers, cradling her jaw, fingers roaming to her throat, and across her shoulders to feel the scarring.

Their kiss is tender, and she moves her lips against his without hunger, intimacy for intimacy's sake. A shiver runs through her at the touch to her new marks, and she is all but helpless against the urge to caress where she had claimed him. The smoothness is a comfort, and she smiles against his lips.

"I forgive you, but you're going to have to build me a better nest, then," she is amused, teasing. But then her voice drops, becomes gentler, "Do not despair your memory. All I have of this is what we have just shared, I cannot expect the same to be for you."

She huffs a laugh, a thought occurring to her, "Though I should like you to remember the bellyful you have left me with." Speaking of it is a thrill. Being _able _to speak of it is a thrill. He remembers, and she can feel all of what that means for him.

If he ever needs to see the sunset again, she will bring it to him.

Fingers trace along the twists and ripples of the scarring on her neck and shoulder, fingers feeling a magnet-like pull to where the darkness coalesces like the edges of watercolor stains. His hand cradles her chin and tilts her head, mouthing softly at her bottom lip, a little nip of blunt teeth as he draws back to smirk, the wind back in his sails now that he is, for lack of a better term, whole.

“So _greedy_, hero. Did I not already give you plenty? I will not hemorrhage on command, else you will surely be the death of this vessel,” he huffs, letting his hand trail down so fingertips stroke over her belly idly. Oh, it’s a look anybody would want to slap off a face, it truly is. “Can a simple man not want to be able to get out of his bed to wash?” He does not reply to her gentle words, but there’s a waver in his soul; he has heard her words, but wishes not to speak of it further.

He loops his arm around her and pulls her tightly to him, pressing the now-milder curve of her belly against him, giving a low growl and a gentle nip to her ear. “If I should _ever _forget…” he rumbles, “-then bring me every last little memory and feeling you have so I may do it again.”

Of course, he’d do it again anyway.

It is with nothing but happiness that she enjoys his touch, basking in how right it feels now that he has reclaimed himself. Fingertips stroke her abdomen and she cannot help it when her breath hitches. "I never said my nest had to be one made of blood," she manages to tease him, though her voice is breathy. "Were you not an Architect? Surely you may craft something for us to lounge in that is a bit more hygienic, and comfortable besides."

When he pulls her to himself again, she feels the chill shift inside of her once more. The slowly absorbing Dark aether is soothing, to her, satisfying in a way that goes deeper than the mere physical. It was placed there by him, can be only ever by him, and perhaps she is greedy but she gives voice to the desire that comes over her.

"I'd like that, to have you do so again," and she hesitates for but an instant before revealing the truth of her want. "Would it truly be greedy to want a part of you inside of me always? I would like that, if it is possible." The monster trills within her, and both parts of her are in agreement. "You have a shard of me inside of you, after all. Fair is fair."

As if she had not just made an earthshattering request, she closes her eyes and hums. "Though a wash does sound nice, for now."

Lips tug further into a greater smile as he catches the light hitch in her breath, dipping his head to kiss her jaw, her neck, her shoulder, grazing his teeth lightly on the ink wash scarring left from his hunger. “Well, the lack of it seemed to be what upset you, my love, otherwise would this not be sufficient? I am an _architect _yes, not an _interior designer._ Goodness, do you not know anything?” His lips leave a trail of hot kisses, until he reaches her throat, his tongue lapping softly at the delicate skin there.

Fingers brace her hip against him, not letting her move lest he not be able to feel the firm swell of her stomach pressing against him. “My love, you cannot be greedy for the things you _deserve,_” he purrs, lifting his head to make half-lidded eye contact with her, gold eyes a steady, predatory gaze as cool, velvet-smooth touch trails around her ankle, wrapping it. The thought does not make him fluster but _delights _him in only the way a monster could be truly thrilled. “But when you are ready, of course. T’would be a dreadful thing for me to make you _fully gravid._” A throaty chuckle rises from his chest as a tentacle teases the back of her leg and thigh, before dissipating into the aether once more.

Other hand stroking through her hair, down to lightly drag nails over the nape and just below, before bracing her against him easily to stand up, fully intent on carrying her. “Then, my dear monster, let us wash our cardinal sins from our bodies, so we may brand more upon our skin.”

Oh, how he preens. With good right to, if she's being honest with herself. He is magnificent even now, to her, and oh how she loves him so, the song at the core of their souls is plenty proof of that. Still, it would not due to let him get away with too much teasing, lest he become completely insufferable. For the moment she holds her tongue, enjoying his touch, the way he lifts her mortal frame so easily.

She does not fight his hold as he carries her, only shifting to press slightly closer to his torso, muscles protesting as she moves. "A brand, hmm? You would tattoo me with the glyph that marks you?" her own voice is a tease, but her emotions through their bond give him the truth - she would wear it in an instant should he desire so. One of her hands moves to rest on her abdomen, on that tiny swell that contains his aether inside, "Just here, perhaps."

Her head tilts back to bare her throat to him, and her body relaxes in his hold. It is a submission more clear than could be conveyed by anything else, to monsters such as they. When she speaks, her voice is soft and full of love, "Will you wash me, Hades?"

Bracing her easily against him, her legs around his waist as he steps softly across the room, nudging a door open with his shoulder that leads to a shower room, plenty big enough, though he notes the crudeness of the shower design, internally grumbling.

_Emet-Selch, you are an architect, not an interior designer,_ he chides himself with a light sigh, reaching to the taps with a pitch dark tendril, twisting each until he feels it may be satisfactory, not letting his grip go, nor allowing either of their mortal bodies to be doused with unpleasantly icy water as hot water is drawn from elsewhere.

He hadn’t...meant branding so literally, but the idea pierced straight through him with a light twitch of his face, pupils dilating, a faint, faint growl in his chest. “My dear, such an activity for a mortal body-” she interrupts him, her palm resting on her belly, and her words find him speechless. Heat prickles across his cheeks and he swallows audibly, his breath forcing out in a soft, needy huff that transcends into a shivering moan as his arousal burns across his thighs, a pressured warmth remaining at his pelvis.

The grip keeping her held to him becomes sharper, cool gold talons pressing tight against soft, bruised skin. “Mmf, do not presume I could not claim you again, hero, tired though I may be,” he growls, a dim, warning glow in his eyes as he steps back into the warmth of the shower with her, his name ringing in his ears, her submission so clear that all his sensible, mortal decorum begins to shed, nuzzling against her neck and _grooming _her with a possessive care and love, tongue long, notch-tipped and rasping lightly against her skin as he rumbles monstrously, tentacles bracing her against him, drifting halfway between here and there in body, his fingers running through her hair, working the water into and through. How could a beast such as he do anything other than dote upon her, his mate? His to love, his to protect, his to claim, his to _cleanse._

Blushing, he is blushing, his face flushed at her words and she is incredibly proud of achieving that. His ancient collected wisdom, all of that baffling wit, and so the few times she manages to cause such a reaction she has to savor. The glint in his eyes sparks low in her belly, and her lips curl at the edges at the feeling of talons on her skin, "Could you brand me in a way that it shows up on whichever form I may take? If a mortal form is your concern."

The water that cascades down onto them, now that he has stepped into the shower, feels heavenly on her tired form. The heat of it slowly relaxes her muscles, and she sighs in contentment. The touch of his tongue upon her is an unexpected treat, and she hums in subdued pleasure as grooms her in his own way. She feels his assertions through their bond, and trills her agreement back at him. She _is _his to do all of these things with, and the purr she makes as his fingers comb through her hair comes from both her chest and her throat.

But that flash of earlier burning, that moan from before that he keeps in check, spurs her onwards. "You try so hard, my love," she murmurs against his wet skin. "So hard to hold yourself back even now. I can see how you want more than to simply wash me."

She relaxes bonelessly against him, an even further submission, "How you want to fill me more, to the brim, until you drip from me. How you want to take me, even now, yet hold yourself back out of a misguided belief that I cannot keep pace with you regardless of how tired this body may be."

Her eyes flick up to meet his faintly glowing ones, "I can, you know. Even as this." And her voice drops into a deeper timbre, that faint growling resonating throughout as she speaks ancient words once more. "My dearest monster, my dearest Hades."

The slow lap of his tongue slows as he considers her request, _Hades _musing it over, his gaze sliding sidewards. “It is...a crude process. But it is a tradition that I am loathe to change,” his words are considered, one hand sliding down to trail gilded talons along her shoulder, sinking in and dragging for just a moment that skin weeps bright red, coppery blood, before smoothing over, healing the wound as fast as he had inflicted it, notched tongue lapping away any blood that the cascading water did not immediately wash away.

Is she satisfied by the answer? He is unsure as she is silent for a while, with him continuing to groom across her collarbones, rumbling contently as his fingers carefully comb through her hair, working out any last starry residue that, however impossible, may have been missed by the snap of his fingers. His breathing is forcefully measured, a low drone of concentration in their bond as his lips grace her throat with a soft graze of dull, Garlean teeth, and then the brush of tongue. He is fine like this. He wants this, just this. It is time to dote, to groom…

His thoughts continue on like that until she speaks, and he is hanging on every word, the low rumble in his chest becoming a growl in his throat, nipping her shoulder sharply. His breath is heavy and hot against her and he manages to growl out “H-hero...do not speak words so candidly.” Inward breath is shivering, the grip of tentacles slipping slightly, lowering her so that her body presses intimately against his arousal, stealing a soft groan from his mouth.

Calling his name in his native tongue is the lowest trick she can play, and he feels himself losing a fight with monstrous compulsion, want, _need_, pushing her against the tiled wall, sickle-clawed hands etching furrows into the walls as gold talons hold her tight, barely breaking the surface of the skin as aching, heated flesh sinks within her, letting out a soft, blissful breath as her warmth surrounds him. Only desperate, only feral as long as he held back, he is firm but gentle as his hips roll, slow thrusts that press his hips tight to hers each time.

He does not want to break her, and that thought reigns over all others as he takes her again, leaving searing kisses on her throat, her jaw, her lips. But, he would fill her again, and he would see her so. The thought sends a shiver up his spine, rocking his whole body, halfway between mortal and monstrous, still enough to dwarf her, skin staining grey-violet across his body, and feather-scales decorating his shoulders and arms. With the deepened, shaded hue of his skin it makes the aether scarring on his shoulder all the more prominent, a dimly lit beacon of her claim on him, indelible and furrowed into his flesh.

**My love,** he speaks softly in that rumbled, ancient tongue. **You are a fool, but a brave fool.** His aether swells and sinks against her, where his teeth may not feast, his soul does, a monster slumbering, woken and its teeth finding purchase on her soul’s reflection. He does not seek to harm, and there is no frenzied, desperate clawing...he would simply seek to have as much of her as he could, as he would in all things, for she is his.

Breath comes shallower, faster to him, his own distracted thoughts and her own words pushing him to a point of arousal that he already feels his peak chasing him. A gold-nailed hand cradles her cheek, meeting her eyes and speaking, hushed, ultimately deferring to her, for he is hers.

**Do you want this?**

Watching Hades slowly lose control is like watching as a cloud move from the face of the moon. Obscured, before, but now letting all of the glory of himself peek through. That she is the cause, that she may do this but with words and a few subtle actions sends heat dripping down to pool in her loins. This monster, her monster, leashed for so long but no longer, with such capacity for savagery yet now he is gentle, so gentle with her.

Trapped between the cold tile and his warmth as he moves her as he wills, so much larger, so much stronger than her body is now, she cries out softly as he sinks into her once more. The monstrousness of his form is in sharp juxtaposition of the gentleness of his actions as he takes her slowly, no savage mating this time but making sweet love to her. He takes his pleasure from her mortal body, hot kisses sending spikes in her own pleasure as he thrusts deep.

This half form of his is beautiful, and through the haze of her mounting pleasure she appreciates his smaller details, how intricate his appearance is. Her eyes catch on the marks she'd left on him, and her desire gives a primal lurch. She can keep pace, she is sure, giving him exactly as good as she gets, and those scars are the truth of that claim. When he speaks, it rumbles through her entire body and she has to close her eyes with the feeling, mouth parted in a soft moan.

Within, where they are joined, she sees the monster awaken. He comes for her with his teeth and she offers her throat up for those jaws, aiming for him to take her there, not to crush but to hold, razor teeth able to tear that reflection to pieces but so trusting that she offers the most vulnerable parts of herself willingly. The ultimate form of trust, there in that void speckled with stars. That he may take her, that he may have all of her - every last piece of her identity is his and _his alone_ and she whispers that both through their bond and aloud.

His slow lovemaking is rapidly pushing her higher, and higher, and when he caresses her face her eyes meet his. Molten gold, pouring love, still hers even as she is his, as he takes her. And oh, how sweet he is, despite his bestial form, despite the instincts they both now share, despite how she has surrendered to him he still defers to her. She is so small yet she holds such power over him, to stop him in this instant should she so wish. And yet the idea is not a novel one, because for her it is the same. Should he submit to her fully, he would remain in power.

But she does not desire to stop this, and she is resolute as she meets his gaze, "Yes, my love, my beautiful beast."

Her pleasure is rising higher, and she does not have the thought about her to communicate what she wants. So she presses through their bond with feeling and thought and aether, even as his teeth close around her throat there within their souls._ Mine _she whispers,_ so beautiful, how did I be so lucky to be yours?_

**If you offered every moment for eternity, for you, my love, it would always be yes.**

Hades’ body lurches, his pace not changing from that slow, rocking push against her, talons brushing around her shoulders as he kisses atop her head, hunching to do so, shrouding her small body almost entirely with his torso and arms. Tendrils hold her firmly against him, leaving his fingers to touch and roam and adore, and the scythe talons to vent monstrous compulsions as their sharp edges run through tiles and plaster.

The monster within keeps a tight hold of her neck, tongue slipping out to caress across her throat, tasting her aether and shivering in delight, but not daring to break even the smallest part of skin, but to hold her tight, possessively for in this moment she is _his._

Fingers slide down her body, between her legs to where he has sunk into her, soft pads of taloned fingertips pressing gently but firmly at the delicate bundle of nerves at the apex of her folds, a slow rub to match each thrust of his hips. He would have her peak with him, unfair it would be for only one of them to be lost in pleasure, his thumb stroking over her belly, anticipating, warning, _promising_ all at once.

Her confession, her request, her permission to do as he wishes makes his soul swell, a glee in it that cannot be quantified in mortal words; that he can, that she has not just submitted to him but has _wanted _it of him. Being wanted, wanted in this way _in this body_ practically makes him see stars outside, not just the ones residing within, joined to her soul as he is now, and unable to filter his thoughts, his wants, his _needs _as his imagination runs free, already planning his later exploits as he claims her, still halfway in the realm of the slumbering.

She is perfect, perfect small and mortal, perfect as monstrous as he, and he gazes at her with nothing but absolute _reverence_, for as long as he can, until physical pleasure sears from his spine to fizz through his mind, dragging his hands away so all four may dig into the wall he has her pressed against, gritting his teeth as he holds back a sound, eventually forced from him as he peaks, vocalizing an otherworldly snarl that twists into a mortal groan.

It is not familiar mortal warmth that fills her but that same abyssal cold. He had held back, even before, believing her too fragile, him too monstrous, to take on as much as he wanted to give, but her words spurred him on, and soon she finds just as before, dark aether, his aether, filling her, coalescing into a heavy firmness that doesn’t stop until, just as she had teased, it drips from her, coating both of their skin as he rocks slowly against her.

Panting hot breaths, his hands let go of the holes gouged into the wall to stroke across her shoulders and back, dipping his head to rumble softly, grooming across the top of an ear. _His, because she has permitted it._

Not in her memory has she been so thoroughly taken against a wall the way he does so now. Completely, in the way that only he can - flashes of memory from a bygone life, of him and how she used to be, of last night, of right now. He stimulates the most sensitive part of her and the fire within her grows ever higher, and she rapidly approaches the cliff.

That desire to take the plunge together, his desires, his glee, fans her flames even as his fantasies do as they bleed through, and in her wanton state she cannot wait to follow through with them. Burning, luminous eyes meet hers as they look at one another, into one another, _through _one another, and she does not flinch when new holes appear in the wall above her head, all four of his hands crushing tile.

His pleasure shrieks through their connection and she plunges off the cliff with him, together, throwing her head back against cold stone and crying out his name in a broken moan as she peaks. Her entire body shakes, clenches, hot everywhere but the icy chill he fills her with, the temperature difference cracking her voice into a higher octave. He fills her, fills her to the brim and overfull, and she can feel it as it oozes out of her where he still rocks within her, drawing out the aftershocks.

All but limp after the crackling pleasure leaves her, pliant putty in his grasp, she manages to turn her head and brush a kiss to the arm closest to her. Despite her limp exhaustion, she reaches down to run her fingers through the aether that had leaked from her, lifting to inspect it. In truth, very little had made its way inside of her this time, enough to fill where she had already absorbed, but the vast majority was smeared upon their skin. Similar to a solid jelly, it was, with plenty of give to it if she squeezed, and shaped into rounded nodules awash in a slightly darker liquid. Curiosity satisfied, she allows her body to go limp fully in his grasp, breath still coming in pants.

She says nothing, what words were there for the two of them? Her emotions travel through to his soul, where she sings of her love, her appreciation, her happiness that she can give herself to him, that he will take her, and that he will do the same in return. The water is still warm as it flows over them both, and she allows her eyes to close for the moment. Not to rest, but to just be, for a time.

She knows that he will take care of her, and she wants him to. She wants him to be able to sate that desire to dote on her almost as much as she wishes to be doted upon, now. A deep feeling, from down within, where her own monster sleeps.

The squeeze of her body around him steals so many groans and sounds of delight from him, letting her call and moan and drinking in each sound as if the sweetest of wine. He smiles, and it is what one might be inclined to describe as _peaceful_, a smile that is both of his outward and inward identity, halfway between both as he is.

A shudder runs down his spine as he feels the steady leak of his offering, his _claim _running between their bodies, caught by warm running water, and without a body to suffuse, soon dissipating in curls of violet. Even the one she carefully looks at in her hands soon dissipates, likely drawn back to his body; his smile draws into a proud smirk, enjoying the sight of her filled and coated with his very essence.

**”Aren’t you beautiful…”** he murmurs softly, and she swears she can hear him croon the word _hero_ somewhere in the back of his mind. For all his need, all his desperation and the way his mind and soul raced with all the things he wanted to do to her, _with her,_ he is stilled now, huffing hot breaths mingled with a low rumble in his throat.

Gently lifting her away from the wall, arms and tendrils slowly lift her, a light tenseness as his softening arousal is slowly withdrawn, exposed to comparatively cooler air and water than the tight, heated embrace of his lover. He kisses her, softly, having her pressed against his upper chest. Putty in his arms, he nuzzles and dotes on her with utter reverence, slowly stepping back into the direct stream of the shower.

Within, Hades curls and settles around her, low, soothing tones as he realizes that he has pushed her so far, and himself with it, and _now_, now it is _finally _time to dote and care and look after her, calming her down after her peak, kissing and holding with no need for further teasing, no touch other than the gentle embrace of four arms holding her secure and safe. While he speaks soft love, murmurs of adoration passing his lips, they are but faint glimmers in comparison to the reverent passion that his soul overruns with.

Slowly sinking to the floor so he may settle her on his lap, blunted sickle-claws easily and tenderly moving her so she is leaned back into the crook of an almost-mortal arm, tendrils supporting her and letting her be as limp and exhausted as she needs to be. A gentle touch of gold, but smooth-tipped talons cups her folds and he makes a soft hushing noise, careful to not tease or overstimulate sore flesh as he guides warm water over, washing the last of semisolid aether and release from her body, soft, reassuring, soothing rumbles in his chest.

His lip catches on a tooth as he grins tiredly, not vocalizing his instinct to scoff and tease. A tentacle reaching for soap, taking it with a hand and smoothing it across her skin, a light lather, washed away with warm water. He attends to her diligently, slow and careful hands working across her body, fingers with dull talons and blunted sickles as not to inflict even the slightest harm on her, cradling her against him, his back rested against a less ruined portion of wall as water cascades down on them.

Gliding the soap over her hair to coat it, he works his fingers in, saponified oils blooming into a rich white that shrouds her hair, softly running his nails across her scalp, down and around the back and sides of her head, shading the water from her with one arm until he is satisfied with his work, moving the huge, taloned hand to the side to allow water to pour onto her, working the soap back out, using the side of his hand to shield eyes from suds. He dips his head to kiss her lovingly, holding that touch until he feels no more soap in her hair, tugging her so she may rest chest-to-chest with him, smiling down at her with pale gold eyes, a low sigh of peaceful contentment that seems to fill every nerve of her body with the same feeling.

He doesn’t want to move, even as water soaks both of them thoroughly. He finds himself quiet, claws and talons and tendrils roaming her in gentle touches, solidifying this moment and branding it into his soul and memories so that he should _never _forget, unable to lose this moment in both body and soul, that he would have this even if every other part of him was lost. A memory of a mortal that he sees and loves, alongside a memory of an Amaurotine that he saw and loves.

**“I love you.”**

She is not Whole, but it no longer seems to matter. When he looks at her, he sees her in all her beauty, and that is only made all the richer for her life being now so short, that she would have to burn so many times brighter, that she _does _burn so many times brighter to so completely match the perfect radiance of who she was, hundreds and thousands of lifetimes ago. She is beautiful, and mortal, and utterly blinding in how perfect she is and has always been.

It’s a quiet thought, but as his hand cups her cheek and his lips press against her forehead, he thinks that he could live like this, one last time, with her. His very soul sighs in contentment, agreement with such a quiet but profound thought.

Yes, he would be happy with that.

What else could she do but allow these attentions, when her mate lavishes them upon her so? The washing, the touches, the words, she soaks them all up as if parched. And she was, she realized. Starved for affection such as this, of touch such as this. Of this complete and total trust and love from both parties, tender and savage both. As he tends to her, she chirps happily in her soul, a soft addition to the ongoing song between them.

His words reach her as if from a distance, and she opens her eyes to give him a small, contented smile. She is embarrassingly tired, though it is not surprising after the night before, after just now. His words are truth, as always, but he finally seems to believe them in their entirety. No more doubts, no hesitations, no comments on her mortal form or the state of her soul. It feels...right. Entirely so. Finally so.

“I love you, too,” she speaks softly, leaning back only to look him in the eyes. She was mortal, yes. He was not, yes. But perhaps that did not matter any longer. Perhaps it never did. They have this life together, now entirely together, in a way not a single other being could understand besides they two.

This moment in the shower, her eyes looking into his, lasts for an instant, for an eternity. They are warm, and loved, and together. It does, however, come to an end. She is mortal, and her body remains such. She is hungry, she realizes, as her body rouses further from her bliss.

All that had happened, she still remains who she was. Her teeth show in a slow grin, perhaps slightly wider than it had been before. "I find that I am hungry, mate of mine. Would you provide for me? I know how you like your propriety," she is amused, laughter in the undertones of her voice.

The corner of his lips quirk up, that smirk she loved so much beginning to play out across his face. They will dry off, they will obtain nourishment of a more physical variety, and then.

Then. They will take the first steps into their new future. As one.

Nothing will be the same, and that is as they wish it.

**Author's Note:**

> Nobody has shame here.


End file.
